


Sirius Sucks at Seduction

by NeonDomino



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Full Moon, M/M, Oblivious Remus Lupin, Sirius sucks at seduction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-06
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 20:54:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29231874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NeonDomino/pseuds/NeonDomino
Summary: Sirius tries to make Remus less stressful in the build-up to the full moon. Or: Remus has never been more stressed out.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 14
Kudos: 63
Collections: A Riddikulus Flash Competition





	Sirius Sucks at Seduction

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [RiddikulusComp](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/RiddikulusComp) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Remus Lupin 10 Minutes to Moonrise (person)

* * *

Remus sets out some clean pyjamas on his bed, and puts his chocolate on his nightstand. Sirius always gets him a hot chocolate, so everything is ready for the morning. He’s stalling though, because his friends haven’t turned up yet and he needs to go.

Worried that they won’t come, Remus picks one of his books to take with him. He leaves, hoping his friends haven’t forgotten about him. They’ll follow, he’s almost certain.

* * *

He hears jazz music in the tunnel. He’s not a fan and is so confused at the music coming from the shack. Perhaps someone has broken in?

There’s little other option than to press on. If there are intruders, he’ll send a message to Dumbledore.

He reaches the open hatch and hesitates. If the hatch is open, someone has come through the tunnel. But going back the other way means he won’t be safe for his transformation.

“Moony, there you are!” Sirius’ head appears upside-down through the hatch, and Remus can only assume Sirius is laying flat on the floor above. Relief fills him. They haven’t forgotten about him. He quickly climbs up into the Shack.

He wasn’t expecting the sight there. Instead of broken furniture, there are beanbags. Jazz music is playing from a radio, and there’s lots of incense and candles. 

“What on Earth - Sirius, what’s going on?”

“You always say that transforming is so stressful, so I thought we’d make the time before as relaxing as possible to help you have a slightly easier transformation.” The look he gives Remus is too adorable, causing Remus to sigh. He knows that look, the big, innocent eyes. Sirius gets away with everything with that expression. Remus is a pushover, so merely nods his head.

“Great. Sit down, we’ll start with a shoulder rub.”

Okay. A shoulder rub does sound good. Maybe this will work out after all?

* * *

Remus feels dizzy from the amount of incense in the room. Smells overlapping and overpowering; Remus’ senses are going haywire. He doesn’t like it. There’s no open windows to let air in.

“Sirius… the incense...”

“Oh? Oh. Right. I’ll sort that now.” Sirius disappears for a minute. “Okay done. Now, it’s time to meditate.”

Sirius has been talking non-stop for the shoulder rub, so some silence would be nice, which is why Remus nods in agreement. Though he’s not finding the jazz music relaxing. But Sirius is _trying_ and that’s what matters.

Sirius retrieves some mats, unrolls them and gestures to Remus to sit down. Remus does, though he’s feeling a little on edge now because the moon is so close, which means the beast is at the very edge, just underneath his skin.

He sits down, closes his eyes, and tries not to cough at the overpowering incense. 

“You’re walking through a field,” Sirius murmurs. “It has those pretty yellow flowers that look all furry in the middle. Those big fuckers that… don’t they turn towards the sun? Sunflowers, that’s it. Right, so you’re in a field of them and there are no bees.”

He pauses and Remus hopes this is the end of it.

“Well, that’s a bit stupid. It’s a field of flowers, so there would be some bees. But they’re not near you. You hear them buzzing from a distance. You’re having a nice walk, there’s no dog shit or anything in the field, which is a plus. Or fox shit, because foxes are gross - like when they scream at each other and it sounds like someone is being murdered? Or when they rip bags open, or… right, but no shit. It’s the best fucking field ever, because people actually pick up after their fucking animals. Good thing bees don’t crap everywhere. Or do they?”

“Sirius,” Remus murmurs.

“Right, off track. Got it. So you’re walking and it’s nice and warm like you’re on holiday, but there’s no sand or anything - sand gets stuck everywhere, so this field is better than the beach. There’s no noise, no people to bother the fuck out of you. Just you… and the bees. They’re just buzzing away doing their own little thing, moving their stripy little butts around the flowers, and stealing all that yellow crap.”

Remus sighs. He wants this to go well, but the wolf is closer to the surface and he’s stressed more than usual.

“So you lay down, surrounded by flowers, but of course you check for shit first. I mean, I know I said there was none, but any sensible person would still look at the ground first just to be on the safe side. And whilst lying there, you realise you have some amazing chocolate. Not that shitty white chocolate, the good milk-chocolate stuff that you like, the smooth, creamy chocolate. Crap no. No chocolate, that’d be all melted and you’d have melted chocolate everywhere and that’s not fun. Except in the bedroom, am I right? No - don’t answer that. I don’t need to know if you’ve got down and dirty with someone with the use of melted chocolate—”

“Good meditation, let’s move on, shall we?” Remus asks between clenched teeth.

“Good idea,” Sirius agrees, grinning away. “Time for relaxing music!”

“It’s not jazz, is it?” Remus asks, warily.

“Course not. It’s much better,” Sirius says. “I learnt it just for you.”

Remus perks up. Sirius has been practising a lot on his guitar lately. He moves to the beanbag. There’s around fifteen minutes left until the moon rises. He has time for two songs before packing up.

Sirius strolls over, looking immensely proud of himself, and Remus is hit by the scent of even more incense. When he looks around, he’s certain he can see twice the amount of incense floating in the air. He looks back as Sirius pulls out some bongos and Remus can only stare.

“James told me these were super romantic in the muggle world,” Sirius explains. “And I know you like muggle things, so… romantic, isn’t it?” With that, he starts hitting away at them, with no rhyme or reason and Remus wants to cry.

* * *

He doesn’t last eight minutes. He can tolerate it for three minutes (because he still doesn’t want to hurt Sirius’ feelings) before he stops Sirius.

“I’ve gotta get this stuff out of here. The full moon is in a few minutes.”

“Ten minutes,” Remus says, glancing around. The incense is still thick in the air, though everything has tossed into the tunnel. “Are the others coming?”

“They’re upstairs. Didn’t want them crowding us.”

“Oh right.” Remus turns his attention back to Sirius. “Are you going up?” he asks, because he needs to strip and Sirius is just staring.

“Yeah, but one last thing. Can you fill out this survey?”

A bundle of papers is shoved into Remus’ hands. He looks down at the first sheet full of questions, and that’s when he snaps.

“No,” he says, pushing the forms back. “Sirius, I can’t do this. It’s ten minutes until the full moon. In fact, tonight…” he trails off, searching for the words. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but I thought that you and the guys would distract me from what’s going to happen, but you didn’t. You actually made me more tense and more stressed and gave me a headache.”

“Remus? I thought… I thought it was good.”

“It was bad,” Remus replies weakly.

“But you asked for more incense?”

“I hated the incense. It hurt my senses,” Remus explains. “And James is fucking with you. Bongos were a bad choice. If you wanted to sing, guitar would have been fine. Or something relaxing and calming rather than banging banging banging. On top of that, you give me a bunch of papers that’ll take at least half an hour to fill out, and I just can’t deal with that. There’s no more time. Just… just go upstairs so I can get changed. Please.”

Sirius doesn’t say anything else. He walks to the trap door, tosses the papers down, ignoring them as they fly all over the tunnel and heads up the stairs without looking at Remus.

Remus feels like shit. Despite Sirius getting this all wrong, Sirius _tried_ and that’s what matters.

But it’s too late to go up and discuss this. The full moon is coming...

He changes, wrapping himself in the old blanket. His clothes and wand get dropped to the floor of the tunnel and he closes it. 

A green shimmer covers it, telling him it’s locked for the night, and he heads towards what was once the living room. The sofa is somewhat intact, and it’s preferable to transform there rather than hit the floor as he does.

* * *

He’s the first up in the morning. Padfoot and Prongs are curled up together in the corner, and Wormtail is on the corner of the sofa. Remus usually drags himself up onto it and pulls the blanket over himself, but he doesn’t this time.

His first thought is Sirius. The papers. Sirius made a questionnaire asking how well he did things and what to improve, and Remus literally threw it back in his face.

He goes straight to the now-unlocked hatch and climbs into the tunnel. He picks up his belongings and dresses, before picking up each sheet of paper and the pen, wincing at the pain as he leans down. He heads back up.

The pages are numbered and he searches for the first and starts filling them out. He fills out notes about what went wrong and why, but he’s polite this time. He explains where needed what sort of things he does find relaxing.

The last page, however, is not part of the questionnaire. He’s not sure it’s even meant to be here. It’s a checklist and there are some ticks on it. It’s possibly not for his eyes, but he reads it anyway.

  * Tidy the shack
  * Light candles for romantic and mood lighting
  * Light incense to get rid of the smell of blood that upsets Remus
  * Shoulder rub because the full moon always hurts Remus’ neck.
  * Talking meditation. Because talking distracts from the full moon. His mum likes sunflowers, so mention them.
  * James said that bongos are the most romantic instrument. Seduce Remus with these.
  * By now Remus should be in love with me too. So maybe a cuddle, and even a kiss before he transforms
  * Convince Remus to be my boyfriend



It’s now so painfully obvious what Sirius has been trying to do, and he feels so much worse.

“I’m sorry,” Remus says when Sirius comes out of the room, his curls falling from the bun that is usually so tidy. “I was a dick last night.”

“You were about to transform,” Sirius mutters. “Understandable. It’s fine. Can we drop it?”

“No. It’s no excuse,” Remus insists. “I should have just spoken to you about it and we could have worked something else out, but I kept quiet and then wasn’t very nice to you. It’s not your fault - you can’t read my mind, and I appreciate the amount of work you put into this.” He reaches for the papers and hands them over.

“You filled these out?” Sirius asks.

Remus nods. “Yeah. It had me thinking about what I’d rather do to relax.”

“Tell me,” Sirius asks, with a hint of desperation in his voice. “I’ll fix it all for next month.”

“Well, just feeling safe and loved helps,” Remus admits, his cheeks reddening. “Cuddling is nice. Just chatting, that shoulder rub, that felt good too. And… well, kissing is also very distracting.”

“Yeah? Anyone in mind?” Sirius asks, and now Remus is aware of Sirius’ feelings, he can hear the hope in his voice, see the emotions in his eyes. How did he not notice this before?

“One person.” With that, Remus steps forward and leans in, his lips brushing Sirius’. “Forgive me.”

“Of course… so, if I get this after fucking up, I wonder what I’ll get when I do a good job,” Sirius says, grinning widely. 

* * *


End file.
